Off the shelf cigarette filling machines currently on the market (particularly those for home or personal use) are slow, lack durability or dependability, and result in frequent mauling of the cigarette blanks and resulting in significant time, effort, and money wasted. One problem frequently encountered in existing machines for personal home use is that the blanks are extremely delicate and are typically loaded for filling by hand. Thus, human error frequently results in a mangled, ripped, or shredded blank. For example, even a small amount of pressure exerted by the user's finger tips often bends the blank as it is being transferred to the nipple extruder on apparatus resulting in tears and mangling. Furthermore, the blank must be transferred to the nipple of the apparatus in the proper position and failure to do so may also result in mauling of the blank as the tobacco or other substrate is fed into it. As mentioned above, these personal use machines are very slow since the user must pick up and load the blanks one by one by hand. The human error caused by dropped blanks, as well as torn or ripped blanks dramatically slows down the process as does the number of arm and hand movements necessary for each blank. User fatigue is also a factor. What is needed therefore is an apparatus that loads cigarettes using the small, personal use machines, improving efficiency and speed, reducing user fatigue, and also minimizing damage to the blanks.